Farther Along
by ilovetvalot
Summary: Another perspective on JJ's departure. After a horrific event, how will any of them ever be the same.


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**Farther Along**

She stared dully at the solid monument in front of her, it's cold, lifeless presence a silent reflection of the recent events. Her eyes still filled with unshed tears even after a week. Her normally vibrant hair seemed lifeless as it fell against her forehead, her habitual sparkling personality now just a shadow in the light of the grim events of a week ago.

Nothing seemed real to her anymore. The color seemed to have permanently seeped from every living thing around her as one day bled into another in an endless haze of pain, leaving her in a perpetual state of grey nothingness.

Nothing helped. Not looking at the thousand pictures she had of them together. Certainly not listening to that last voice mail from her friend that she'd forgotten to delete from the night before she died. Not even the bittersweet visit she'd had with her godson the evening before had allowed the ache in her chest to ebb. All she had seen each time she'd gazed upon young Henry's visage was JJ's eyes staring back at her.

It should have been a comfort.

But it wasn't. It hurt. Violently.

Everything hurt, even breathing. The only respite from the pain was sleep, and even those fitful moments were colored by dreams about the two of them and the many adventures they'd shared together over the years.

They'd been sisters in all but blood, their ties tighter than any mere strands of DNA. They were family. And now, it had all been shattered by a lone gunman's bullet in a senseless drive-by shooting. Wrong place. Wrong time. So horribly trite that the very thought brought bile rising into her throat once again.

Swallowing quickly as she struggled to pull fresh air into her lungs, Penelope Garcia shook her head, desperately trying to clear the thoughts that seemed to overtake her every waking moment.

It wasn't fair! None of it. JJ had a family...a son and a man that had loved her desperately. But now, JJ was gone. Forever.

And yet, here she sat. Alone. No family. No ties. And she got to live. Where was the justice in that?

She'd run the emotional gamut of emotions. Fear when she'd received Will's horrible call. Pain when she'd stood by JJ's bedside, gazing down at the young woman's beautifully serene face as her heartbeat had slowed. Anger when she'd learned of the pointless violence that had surrounded her best friend's death.

And now...now, there was this dull, throbbing ache that never lifted from day to day. Unchanging, its insidious presence only served to heighten her already tenuous mental balance. She knew she was walking an emotional tightrope, striking out at well-meaning colleagues and friends who tried to comfort her...avoiding what was left of the family that had called her one of theirs.

And she knew, above all, that this would be the very last thing that Jennifer Jareau would have ever wanted.

But none of it mattered. She couldn't shift, couldn't release the grief that seemed to fill her very bones.

"You're going to catch your death sitting out here without a coat, Penelope," a deep voice admonished from behind her as kind hands dropped the heavy weight of a man's suit coat over her slumped shoulders.

"Do you promise?" Penelope asked without lifting her head, her throat aching with the effort of those simple words.

"Stop it," the masculine voice growled, it's timbre hardening. "If she could, she'd kick your ass for a comment like that," the man continued, nodding toward JJ's final resting place.

Now THAT got her attention. Had the stoic, staid Aaron Hotchner just used the word 'ass'? Turning her head and cocking it slightly, she stared at him through swollen eyes, the faint sunlight outlining his dark head.

"Don't look at me like that," he ordered, keeping his gaze fixed on the etched gravestone in front of them, "You know I'm right."

"Maybe," Garcia admitted grudgingly, her tone hoarse, her throat still raw from her many tears.

"Penelope," Hotch warned gently, leaning toward her and nudging her arm softly.

"Fine!" Garcia exploded, that simple motion opening the floodgates of her emotions. "I KNOW you're right, Agent Know-It-All, but that doesn't help anything right now!" she shouted, wiping furiously at the tears that began dripping down her flushed cheeks angrily. "It doesn't bring her back, does it? It doesn't give me any answers from a Higher Power as to WHY! Why, damn it, Hotch? Tell me why!" she virtually screamed as she shot to her feet, her arms held stiffly at her sides as her hands balled into fists.

Rising as the loud sobs wracked the former optimist, Hotch gently surrounded her shaking frame in a tender embrace. "I can't, Penelope. I wish I could, but I don't have any explanations other than the trite ones you've already heard. Random acts of violence...senseless killing...you've heard them all. All I can do is repeat what someone once told me after Haley died when I was asking these same questions."

"What was that?" Garcia whispered, her words muffled against Hotch's solid chest, her cheek pressed against his shirt as she let herself be held.

"We're not supposed to ask why. We're supposed to trust that those answers will come farther along. Maybe when we're stronger. Maybe when we're more prepared to listen. Maybe when we're standing in front of St. Peter. I don't know when and neither did they. But I have to believe that one day it will all make sense. Sometimes you just have to accept things based on faith," he replied softly.

"That doesn't make the hurting stop, Hotch," Garcia said brokenly, lifting her head enough to gaze up into solemn dark eyes.

"Nothing can do that now, Penelope. The best I can do is tell you that you're not hurting alone," Hotch replied, his quiet words finally penetrating the deep fog of her mind.

"I'm not hurting alone," Garcia repeated shakily, dropping her head back to the unmoving wall of Aaron Hotchner's chest. And this time when she wept, she wept for them all.

And so did he.

_**Finis**_


End file.
